The present invention relates generally to wind, water or other fluid stream actuated devices, and more particularly to such devices employing a plurality of blades or vanes, each movable about its respective axis, and with the several blade axes distributed about and parallel to the central axis of a wheel which supports the several vanes. Even more particularly, the present invention is concerned with such a fluid stream actuated device wherein the vanes exhibit tilting or oscillatory motions about their axes during each revolution of the support wheel about its axis.
It is known generally in the prior art, as illustrated by the so-called cycloid ship propeller and West German Patent No. 742,788 to movably support blades on a wheel body so that when wind is blowing, aerodynamic buoyancy forces or lift occurs at the blades, causing the wheel body to rotate, and thereby deriving energy from the fluid flow. Such arrangements may be adjusted to any wind direction.
However, this known arrangement for exploiting wind power has the disadvantage that several blades are positioned transversely to the direction of the wind, bringing with it the risk that during a storm with very high wind velocities, the blades may break. An additional disadvantage is that due to the fixed position of the blades, the RPM of the wheel body may be controlled only within very narrow limits.
Installations which exploit the power of flowing water are generally constructed to be actuated by one certain flow under optimum conditions, that is, the direction the fall head and other parameters of fluid flow must be just right, and if any changes in these parameters occur, the installation becomes completely ineffective or performs at a substantially reduced efficiency.